…Arts Wednesday, October 7, 2020 — 13 The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com The first time I understood George Balanchine was watching “The Nutcracker.” More precisely, it was while watching a recording of Act 2’s “Waltz of the Flowers” on YouTube, with New York City Ballet’s Ashley Bouder as the leading Dewdrop. The six- minute dance is the culmination of the Christmastime ballet’s divertissements and the music builds with un...…
…T he vigorous string melody halted, and the film came to an abrupt end. Dazed, my friend Haoyu and I sat silently in the darkness of State Theatre without moving an inch of our bodies. When we heard the sound of clapping from below us, we subconscious- ly clapped along too. A warm yellow light slowly re-illuminated the theater. While people started getting up and preparing to leave, Haoyu and I were still glued to our seats, re...…
…F or the first 18 years of my life, I lived about a hundred yards away from my grandmother’s house. As a kid, I’d skip down the street to her house for a din- ner of PopTarts and games of Kings in the Cor- ner, “PBS NewsHour” always playing on the TV in the background. The TV volume muffled the sound of the back door, so I’d tiptoe as far into the living room as I could before announc- ing my arrival, to surprise her. We’d catc...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com statement Wednesday, October 7, 2020 — 16 On making friends during a pandemic BY LEAH LESZCZYNSKI, STATEMENT COLUMNIST E ver since I arrived on campus last year, vetting classmates in discussions, student organization meetings and informal gatherings, in hopes of creating more fulfilling human connections has become second nature to me. Prior to the new world created by the COVID-19 pan- d...…
…Ten months into his first season on a Division I coaching staff at Illinois State, 37-year-old Luke Yaklich created a Microsoft Word file on his computer. He named it “When I Become a Head Coach.” Yaklich divided the file into four sections: offense, defense, culture and recruiting. Tidbits of information — gleaned from picking the brains of other coaches and scouts, reading books, watching online clinics and just being aro...…
…For the Mattins, Michigan’s family atmosphere is only fitting In sports, your team is a family. Developing a relationship keeps the team together, and the closer it is to a family, the better. But the Michigan wrestling team is a step above the others, featuring three pairs of family members — the Amines, Corrells and Mattins. What has the program done to attract so many siblings? For the Mattin brothers, it’s the family conne...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Sports Wednesday, October 7, 2020 — 19 With three weeks until opener, offensive line hoping to find stability Offensive line, by nature, is a position rooted in contact. So this fall, when Michigan had to practice without pads until last Wednesday, it was perhaps the position group hardest hit. A year ago, the Wolverines would have been well equipped to handle such adversity. Their offensiv...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com 20 — Wednesday, October 7, 2020 …
…Movie theaters and performance venues can reopen Oct. 9 in accordance with public health guidelines, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced in a Friday press release. Whitmer also altered limits on indoor and outdoor gatherings, putting a formula in place to determine capacity at different locations. In a statement, Whitmer said the state’s early steps to combat the virus made it possible to loosen restrictions. “Michigan took...…
…Gov. Gretchen Whitmer aims to make Michigan completely carbon neutral by the year 2050, her office announced in a press release Wednesday. “The science is clear – climate change is directly impacting our public health, environment, our economy and our families,” Whitmer said in a statement. “This dangerous reality is already causing harm throughout Michigan, with communities of color and low-income Michiganders sufferi...…
…In May, protests erupted in Ypsilanti after a video showed the officer repeatedly hitting Grady El in the head. Elected officials, candidates and community members spoke out against racial injustice in education, the criminal justice system and the economy during Saturday’s event. Eli Savit, Democratic candidate for Washtenaw County prosecutor, said the charge for wanton endangerment — but not for Taylor’s murder — proved t...…
…About 50 people and public officials attended a virtual public hearing with the Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners, Ann Arbor City Council, Scio Township Board of Trustees and the Huron Watershed Council regarding the Gelman Plume Litigation Settlement on Thursday evening. U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Mich., moderated the hearing. The Gelman Plume is the spread of the chemical 1,4-dioxane into soil and groun...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com News Wednesday, September 30, 2020 — 5 Students and faculty work to adapt to hybrid courses With 22 percent of LSA classes being taught in the hybrid or in-person format, the disconnect between students in the classroom and students on Zoom coupled with the technological learning curve has proved challenging for hybrid courses. LSA sophomore Michelle Ascrizzi is enrolled in a hybrid ...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Michigan In Color 6 — Wednesday, September 30, 2020 As a first-year living on campus during a widespread pandemic, my concerns about daily life at the Univeringly continue to increase. The administration does not seem to be taking the struggles of students into consideration, evident from the increase in our tuition, prevalence of lab fees and blatant lack of student testing. When I sit ...…
…Wednesday, September 30, 2020 — 7 The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Michigan In Color 7500 miles from our native Ann Arbor campus lies the Pakistani city of Karachi, a metropolis renowned for its linguistic, ethnic and reli- gious diversity. Just 750 miles from Karachi exists Lahore, the next largest Pakistani city notable for its social liberal- ism, high level of educational quality and literary works. Despite these positive ...…
…Opinion T hough it is good that social media sites, particularly Twitter, are finally working to prevent the rampant spread of misinformation on their platforms, this alone is not enough. These fact-checking provisions are limited in scope, and thus do not absolve social media users of responsibility for verifying that content they consume or amplify is factually accurate, especially when it relates to topics as paramount as...…
…I ’m sure you’ve all heard by now, but the long-seated Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died. She passed away on Sept. 18 and immediately reinvigorated a partisan conflict that’s been brewing for the past four years. Her body hadn’t even been cold, and people were already in an uproar about what the proceeding replacement would look like. Sentiments over former President Barack Obama’s appointee, Justice Merric...…
…7-Opinion Opinion The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com I f I asked you what are cars for, there are a few answers I might expect you to give me. Cars expand our horizons by letting us travel farther. They save time by letting us travel faster. Or, maybe you would simply say that we need cars: We need them to get to our places of work, to get to the store and buy food, to visit our families — in short, to live our lives. If car...…
…In the United States there has long been a strange fascination with stories of the American backwoods — gritty tales of brazen crime, graphic murder, religious fanaticism and twisted mentalities. They fixate on the post-war rural South and glorify the violence that erupts among the backwoods folk. And there’s never a person of color in sight. This is the vein of “The Devil All the Time,” a stark tale of rural Ohio and West V...…
…Last week, Mickey Guyton made history as the first Black woman to perform solo at the Academy of Country Music Awards. She sang to an empty Grand Ole Opry house where lights lined the pews instead of people. The audience watching from home was largely unfamiliar with Guyton or her music — her debut “Better Than You Left Me” peaked at #34 on the Billboard Country Airplay Chart in 2015, her highest-charting single to date. Nonethel...…
…Arts Wednesday, September 30, 2020 — 13 The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com “extremely online” to my friends, they usually agree — they too love memes and spend hours on Twitter. gets messy. It usually turns into some form of me reciting my own version of Bane’s quote from “The Dark Knight Rises”: “You merely adopted the internet; I was born in it, molded by it.” Like all great horror movies, “Antebellum” is barely fiction. ...…
…I n his article for Geo- graphical Review, geog- rapher Blake Gumprecht posits the American college town as “a place apart, a unique type of urban community shaped by the sometimes conflicting forces of youth, intellect and idealism that have been a critical but underap- preciated part of American life.” I have a hard time agreeing with the second part; the image of a youthful, crafty, idealistic American is practically a ste- re...…
…L ate in the evening of the Jewish New Year Rosh Hashanah on Sept. 18, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away from complications related to pancreatic cancer. Upon hearing the news of her passing, it is understandable why so many responded with punditry on the upcoming battle over her replacement on the Supreme Court of the United States and its intersection with the upcoming election on Nov. 3. Recognizing the possibil...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com statement Wednesday, September 30, 2020 — 16 A lesson from past pandemics BY WILLA HART, STATEMENT COLUMNIST L ast week, in one of my history classes, Sick- ness and Health Since 1492, I was assigned the reading “The Cholera Years” by Charles E. Rosenberg. The book is a dense, nearly 300-page account of the United States cholera epidemics of the 1800s; the syllabus had us reading all but on...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Sports Wednesday, September 30, 2020 — 17 Will Tschetter leads a simple life. He lives on his family farm in the rural outskirts of Stewartville, Minn., a community of roughly 6,000 people. He doesn’t have social media. Basketball is his passion, but farm work comes first; he once instructed Juwan Howard to call him back so he could finish hauling the day’s load of rocks. Perhaps it’s fitting...…
…Jaylen Jones and Tyler Fullman are two supremely talented student athletes from Georgia and Chicago, respectively. They both have athletic accolades under their belts, and they both have their sights set on professional ball. Jones and Fullman are two Black pitchers who will join Michigan’s baseball team next year. They will find themselves under the tutelage of coach Erik Bakich, who has gained national attention in ...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Sports Wednesday, September 30, 2020 — 19 Undersized and overlooked, Ronnie Bell set to anchor young receiver corps Ronnie Bell had been exiled from campus amid the pandemic. Gyms were closed. So were local football fields. But the junior wide receiver had to find a way to train. So on his second day home, his dad came up with the ultimate workout. That’s how Bell ended up pushing a Ch...…
…20 — Wednesday, September 30, 2020 The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Vote March 10 …
…After the Graduate Employees’ Organization voted to accept the University of Michigan’s proposal and end its strike, Rackham student Bec Roldan posted their feelings about the offer on TikTok. “To be frank, it’s a pretty s— offer,” Roldan said on the popular social media app, where they have been posting updates about the strike since it began Sept. 8. Roldan said in the TikTok that they were frustrated they had to accept t...…
…The Graduate Employees’ Organization found broad support for their demands for greater accommodations against COVID-19, but its anti-policing demands became a lightning rod issue for those trying to criticize or delegitimize the union’s strike. Negotiations between the University of Michigan and the Graduate Employees’ Organization have been at the center of conversation on campus since GEO announced their stri...…
…“This time is for us to come together and say, ‘Well, the University’s cruelty is on full display, we gave them every opportunity not to be cruel, they have every opportunity not to be, it’s a choice, in a big way,’” Peterson said. “These people have real power: President Schlissel has real power, Provost Collins has real power, Anne Curzan has real power, the regents have real power. So that all of them pander to us by saying th...…
…Solomon Rajput decided to put medical school on hold in September 2019 and run for U.S. Congress in Michigan’s 12th district against incumbent Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, D-Mich. After losing the primary election in August, Rajput went back to medical school and started Done Waiting, an organization working to get other progressive candidates elected. “That night of the election and the day after we were thinking, ‘You k...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com News Wednesday, September 23, 2020 — 5 COVID-19 reported at Brown Jug as semester began The Brown Jug, a popular student restaurant and bar on South University Avenue, has reported at least six positive COVID-19 cases among staff since late August. A server, who requested to remain anonymous due to fear of retaliation from their employer, told The Daily six employees tested positive for COV...…
…The Remarkable Brevity of Grief The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Michigan In Color 6 — Wednesday, September 23, 2020 So it begins. The bass drums through me as I move my body to the music, my eyes closed. Psi U is full of bodies, all moving in a haze. If I swing my hips too quick- ly to one side, I find myself grazing a hip, but if I miss the rhythm, a hand creeps along my side. The dance floor is a careful game, where if y...…
…Wednesday, September 23, 2020 — 7 The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Michigan In Color Twitter has always been my social media drug of choice. My timeline — essentially Arab twit- ter, Muslim twitter and Leftist twitter, speaks to my personal- ity and beliefs to a concerningly accurate degree. As my relation- ship with Twitter has adapted — what was once a 30 minute daily check-in has seamlessly transitioned into a pandemic ritua...…
…7-Opinion Opinion I f you’ve been on the Ann Arbor campus of the University of Michigan between 5 a.m. and 5 p.m. this past week, you’ve likely heard chants of “Solidarity Forever,” impassioned speeches about quarantine conditions and a noticeable lack of construction noise. If you haven’t figured it out by now, the Graduate Employees’ Organization, non-unionized resident advisers and a host of MDining staff have been striki...…
…W hen I think of a social media influencer, I typically think of a young, white woman promoting skin care products and niche clothing brands to her 10,000 or more followers between posts about her glamorous life. I follow a couple of influencers, vaguely interested in the pseudo-fame that comes with having an Instagram platform and occasionally taking their book recommendations or recipe ideas. I associated these influencers a...…
…Opinion The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com T his week, President Donald Trump came to Michigan to ask for our votes in an election that’s now less than 50 days away. But Trump didn’t come to Michigan to campaign to undecided voters. At no point did he make any discernible attempt to have an honest conversation with Michigan voters about issues and policies that affect their lives. Instead, Trump’s superspreader grievance tou...…
…2-News Wednesday, September 23, 2020 — 11 Arts The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com FILM REVIEW ‘The Babysitter’ is gory, mindless fun In need of a laugh and looking for a Tarantino knockoff with a B-list cast? Look no further than “The Babysitter: Killer Queen,” released last Thursday on Netflix. This film is a sequel to Netflix’s 2017 film “The Babysitter.” At the time of writing this, “Killer Queen” is #3 in th...…
…Last spring, the Daily Film beat was inspired by the doldrums of quarantine and the introduction of Disney+ to watch and review a number of Disney Channel Original Movies — DCOMs for short. There are many ways to look at DCOMs — as relics of the 2000s, as problematic attempts at representation, as textbook examples of the power of nostalgia — but there is no denying that they are somewhat trivial in the grand scheme of things. If w...…
…Arts Wednesday, September 23, 2020 — 13 Pepe the Frog’s fall from grace in ‘Feels Good Man’ This review has taken longer to write than I, or my editors, expected. In the last few days my time has been spent digesting the insidious darkness that characterizes “Feels Good Man.” This documentary follows the tale of Pepe the Frog and the character-turned-meme’s journey to become a symbol of hate. But it is also a tale of ...…
…I put my fingers on the scanning screen for the third time, as the machine was unable to recognize my fingerprints. After finally succeeding, I quickly put my mask back on as my fingers fumbled with my immigration documents. “Please come with me,” a U.S. Customs and Bor- der Protection officer sig- naled in my direction after I passed the Canadian bor- der into the United States, proceeding to walk me to a door on ...…
…W hat does it mean to live in a community? In one sense, a commu- nity is a group of people who have something in common. When I reflect on what I have in common with my fellow students, faculty and staff, two things come to mind. The first is our affiliation with the University of Michigan. The mere fact of affiliation, however, confers little significance within Ann Arbor. Meeting a fellow Wolverine in your hometown or on...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com statement Wednesday, September 23, 2020 — 16 Take a seat BY TAYLOR SCHOTT, STATEMENT CONTRIBUTOR H ave you ever tried to count all of the benches in Nichols Arboretum? I tried once and have only an estimate to show for it: 72. Though I know that an estimate is bet- ter than nothing, better than not trying at all and better than letting that curios- ity fade into the recesses of a cluttere...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Sports Wednesday, September 23, 2020 — 17 T he last Michigan team to win a national title was men’s gymnastics. The last one before that was also men’s gymnastics. By any measure, it’s among the most success- ful programs in the school’s history, with six national titles and three in the last decade. In short, when Kurt Golder — the coach who won those championships — talks, you sho...…
…On Aug. 23, a video went viral of a police officer shooting a Black man named Jacob Blake seven times in his back in front of his family in Kenosha, Wisc. Yet another disturbing story of police brutality, the shooting of Blake sent shockwaves to the growing protests and marches that had been happening since June in cities across the country. Three days later, the Milwaukee Bucks’ players decided that it was not appropriate to co...…
…The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Sports Wednesday, September 23, 2020 — 19 Report: Jalen Mayfield hoping to opt back in for 2020 season When Michigan begins its season on Oct. 24, it will do so with one of its top prospects for the 2021 NFL Draft. On Friday afternoon, Rivals reported that offensive tackle Jalen Mayfield was hoping to opt back into the 2020 season after originally declaring for the draft in August. Mayfiel...…
…For years, Joe Milton’s talent has been a mercurial talking point at the tip of Michigan coaches’ tongues. There are the stories, repeated ad nauseum, of his arm strength. Early in his Michigan career, the stories go, he injured receivers with passes zipped in at warp speed. Eighty- five yards, allegedly, is his maximum throwing distance. Giles Jackson has one of those stories too, as told in a Zoom call with reporters Thursday. “In pr...…
…ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM See RA, Page 3 ANN ARBOR, MI | WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2020 | MICHIGANDAILY.COM GOT A NEWS TIP? E-mail news@michigandaily.com and let us know. INDEX Vol. CXXIX, No. 130 ©2020 The Michigan Daily N E WS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 M I C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 O PI N I O N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 A R T S ...…
…When LSA junior Sam Burnstein arrived at the University of Michigan’s quarantine housing at Northwood apartments, he was underwhelmed by what he found. “When walking into the apartments here, the whole time I kept thinking, ‘This feels like a big afterthought,’” Burnstein said. “It feels like the University had, like, two or three weeks till the school year starts and they’re like, ‘Oh, we need somewhere to put...…
